


Prophecies

by sonictrowel



Series: Long Night in the Blue House [79]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Action/Adventure, F/M, Gen, I mean, Not that much action, Talking, but this is DW, dramatic talking is half of the action, ish?, it's more
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-08
Updated: 2017-08-08
Packaged: 2018-12-13 00:55:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11748747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonictrowel/pseuds/sonictrowel
Summary: “So,” said the younger Doctor as he stepped out of the TARDIS, “we rock up to the Panopticon and what, demand access to the Matrix?  Or just skip the pleasantries and try to sneak through the Cloisters?”“Well, they’ll never expect me to try it twice, eh?”“Oh,” he said drily, shaking his head, “even better.”“Unless, of course, a less idiotic option presents itself,” the Doctor added.“The usual plan, then.  I’ll be sure to keep my eye out for one."





	Prophecies

**Author's Note:**

> Definitely make sure you're caught up on all the back chapters before this one!! :)

 

“So,” said the younger Doctor as he stepped out of the TARDIS, “we rock up to the Panopticon and what, demand access to the Matrix?  Or just skip the pleasantries and try to sneak through the Cloisters?”

“Well, they’ll never expect me to try it twice, eh?”

“Oh,” he said drily, shaking his head, “even better.”

“Unless, of course, a less idiotic option presents itself,” the Doctor added.

“The usual plan, then.  I’ll be sure to keep my eye out for one.  Bit of a hike to the Citadel,” the Fop said, turning to look behind the TARDIS.  “Wonder what she dropped us out here for.  Well, I guess they’re less likely to be looking for us strolling in on foot.  Shall we?”

The Doctor shrugged expansively.  “After you.”

“Hah.”

They’d gotten about two yards when they heard the unmistakable _vwoorp_ of an incoming TARDIS.

“Oh, we’re off to a _great_ start,” the Doctor said flatly.  “I think this might be a new record.”

“If they’ve come to lock us up, at least they’ll give us a ride.”

The Doctor snorted as the TARDIS materialised a few yards ahead of them.  It was a standard cylindrical shell, and hadn’t landed for a second before a young woman with short blonde hair and a long grey coat burst out of it.  She immediately whirled back around to face her ship, seeming not to take notice of them.

“Oh, no no no.  This is rubbish!  This is the _actual most possible rubbish._  I’m switching it off.”  

She made to re-enter the TARDIS and collided with another young woman exiting.  The latter was densely freckled, with a lot of red hair piled on top of her head, dressed in all in greens and greys.

“We’re supposed to be incognito, remember?  Doesn’t get much blander than this, particularly on Gallif...rey…”  The second woman had spotted them.  “Oh… my god.”  She froze, wide-eyed.

“What?” asked the first one, turning round again.  “Did you s- _WAH!”_ she shouted and immediately clapped her hand over her mouth.

“Um, hello there!” said the Fop as they walked closer.

The red-haired woman waved half-heartedly, looking dazed.

“We’re, uh…” he looked to the older Doctor.  He shrugged.  “Well, we’re the Doctor.”

“Um, he-eeyy!” the blonde woman grinned nervously at them.  “Person… collectively known as the Doctor!  You’re on your way to the Citadel, probably, yeah?  So are we; not much else around, hahah!  In a bit of a hurry, why don’t we walk and talk, eh?  Come along… you,” she said, grabbing the other woman’s hand.

The Doctors exchanged a look as the newcomers took off toward the city, the redheaded one glancing back over her shoulder at them as she was dragged along.

The Fop shrugged, and they followed.

“And have you got names?” he asked.

“Oh, yep!  Definitely, uh, definitely have those!” said the blonde woman.  “I’m, ah, Theee...vrosaxinrasila.  Thevros!  And this is my, uh, friend... Ariasingilatel.”

The ginger woman had her head in her hand, cringing.

“Aria...si. For short!”

The Doctor raised an eyebrow, exchanging another look with his younger self.  While it was painfully obvious that she was lying, it wasn’t as if he hadn’t used the odd false name himself.  And they seemed genuinely surprised to have company, so chances were good they hadn’t been sent by the High Council.

“What brings you two to the Citadel?” he asked.

“Oh, you know.  Business,” said evidently-Ariasi.

“Yep, very, very, busy… business,” Thevros said distractedly.

Ariasi pinched the bridge of her nose.

“And you?” Thevros asked.

“Oh, ah, well, we’re um, we’re here to ah…”

“Inspect the cybersecurity systems,” the Fop finished.  “We’re... independent auditors.”

Ariasi continued to look like she was trying not to make a face.  Thevros looked like she was running that answer through a lot of mental calculations.  Conclusion: neither of them were buying it.

The Doctor squinted at them.  Something was really— _oh, shit._

He quickly shoved his bandaged hand into his pocket, but not before the wisp of golden energy had caught their attention.  Thevros looked horrified, her mouth dropping open; Ariasi frowned in concern.

“Are you alright?” she asked.

“Oh, just peachy,” the Doctor replied, flashing her a grin.  “Happens sometimes.  It’s a… thing.  Condition.  Nothing to worry about.”

“Right,” she said slowly, her frown deepening.

The Fop grabbed the Doctor’s sleeve, slowing down to put some distance between them and their new companions.

“Should we really be doing _this_ in the middle of you doing _that!?”_ he hissed through gritted teeth.

“I’m not doing anything,” the Doctor grumbled.  “It’s fine.”

“You can’t hold it off forever!  Either you let it happen, or you might possibly _explode_ a bit, or you just plain drop dead!  And seeing as you’re me, I’d really prefer you chose the first option!  Whatever happens here, you’ve got to stick around for Milly.”

“Well I can’t very well do it right now, can I?  Who knows what I’m going to end up like.  Lost my damn memory the last time.  I won’t be much use to anyone like that!”

The younger Doctor groaned.  “Oh no, that’s _still_ happening?”

The Doctor became aware that the two women were having their own hushed conversation a few paces ahead, with the occasional anxious glance back in their direction.

“What do you suppose their game is?” he mumbled.

“Well, they’re obviously lying about their names, but glass houses, etcetera.  Why, what are you thinking?”

“Not sure.  Something’s bothering me.”

“Could it be, I don’t know, that you’re currently trying to prevent yourself from regenerating through sheer bloody-mindedness?”

“Shut up.”

They made strained conversation for the rest of the walk to the city. The women claimed to be Gallifreyan natives (well, they certainly had the pseudonyms for it,) but the fact that they hadn’t reacted at all to the two of them introducing themselves as the Doctor was a very large red flag.  Tension mounted as it became more and more evident that everyone present was very much aware that everyone else was lying through their teeth, and the Doctor wondered at what point they could safely shake off their new entourage.  Though his curiosity was beginning to rival his desire to escape them.

“Well,” the Fop announced when they’d entered the sphere, “we’re for the vaults— security inspection, you know.  I suppose you two are headed to the business district?”

Thevros and Ariasi exchanged a look.

“Actually,” Ariasi said finally, “it’s the vaults for us as well.  Different sort of business.”

“Oh?  And what sort is that?” the Doctor asked, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

“...Fine,” she sighed after a pause, “for... some reason, I’ve a feeling you’re not going to turn us in.  We have a dial.”  She met Thevros’s eyes.  “A good friend of hers died, and they’d been banished, so they weren’t permitted to be uploaded to the Matrix.  We don’t think that’s quite right.”

“So you’re sneaking in to upload them?” the Fop asked, quite transparently sounding like he was suddenly fonder of their new companions.

“Got a problem with that?” she asked.

“On the contrary.  It’ll be a… great test of the security systems.  As I’m sure my colleague will agree.”

The Doctor suddenly realised that he had been so absorbed in thought that he’d been glaring at them.

“What?  Oh, yes.  Very useful.”

“It won’t be easy, though,” said the younger Doctor.  “The, ah, firewalls down there in the Cloisters, they’re pretty tricky.”

“Oh, you just leave that to me,” said Ariasi.

He raised his eyebrows and looked back at the Doctor, who was once again lost in thought.  “Well.  Lead on, then.”

Thevros had been conspicuously silent, and kept throwing nervous glances at the Doctor’s hand, still stuffed into his pocket.

It would probably go away if he kept ignoring it, right?  Two thousand years at it, someday that strategy had to work out for him.

They slipped into the Cloisters with surprising ease; he’d rather expected them to have ramped up security after the last time, Sliders or no.  They probably did think he wasn’t stupid enough to try walking right in here again.  Hah.  Would they never learn?

“So,” the Fop whispered, “how do we do this?  And do we just let them watch us do it?  We don’t even know who they are.”

“Awful coincidental that the TARDIS dropped us here the same time they were sneaking in to make illicit use of the Matrix as well, don’t you think?”

“There is that.”

“As for the other bit, any thoughts?” the Doctor asked, glancing over his shoulder and beginning to wonder about the total lack of wraiths.

“Dive in and hope we figure something out at the last second?” the Fop suggested.

“The usual, then.”

“We need to find a direct access point, unless you want to go hunting for Rassilon’s crown.  There must be one down here.  Who’s the Keeper these days?”

“Not sure,” the Doctor mumbled, “but they’ve really been lying down on the job.”

Thevros and Ariasi came to a stop in front of a large section of stone circuitry.

“I do hope you’ll let them know that their security is sorely lacking,” Ariasi said, stepping up to the wall.

“Yes, I’m… a tiny bit concerned about that,” said the Fop.  “It’s usually not actually a good thing when an operation of this nature seems to’ve gone off _too_ easily.”

“Oh, that was me,” she said.  “The wraiths are offline.  They’ll reboot once we’re safely out of here.”

“You?” the Doctor asked incredulously.  “You didn’t do anything.  We haven’t even located an access point.”

She just smiled at him, and his hearts suddenly skipped a beat.  He opened his mouth to speak, but failed to form words.

“Hey,” Thevros said, grasping her hand, “careful in there.”

“Am I not always?” she asked innocently.

Thevros snorted.

Ariasi vanished.  Immediately, the Cloister bells began to chime.

“W— where’s she gone?” the younger Doctor sputtered.  “There’s no way in!”

“Oh, there’s always a way, if you know where to look,” said Ariasi’s voice, echoing with the tolling of the bells.  “I’m... gifted with this sort of thing.  Comes from my mother’s side.”

The Doctors gaped at each other.

As his pulse picked up and a question loomed, too terrifying to even voice itself properly in his mind, the older Doctor didn’t notice the tingling, at least not until he noticed two pairs of wide eyes staring at him.

“Oh, shit,” he hissed.  The glow had lit both of his hands and was creeping up his arms and drifting into the air around him.  With every iota of stubbornness in his mulish old soul, he shoved it down.  

 _No. I am_ not _doing this!_

“No, no, _no!”_

He gasped in relief as the energy dimmed, but this time, it didn’t fade completely.  His palms continued to pulse with a faint, warm glow.

“I think that’s probably… not good,” said the Fop.

“It’s fine!” he snapped, shoving both hands into his pockets and turning to face Thevros.   _“You._  Tell me what’s really going on here.  She didn’t even have a dial!  And how can she possibly just—” he choked on his words, punching down the hope in his treacherous hearts the same way he’d beaten down the regeneration energy.  

Incompletely.

“Who are you, really?”

“Well,” she said, watching his slightly glowing pockets nervously, “there _is_ one way you could find that out.”

Before he could respond, shouts and heavy footsteps echoed through the Cloister.

“Doctor,” said the wry voice of the General-turned-President.  “What a nice sur...prise…”

He turned to face her.  She was flanked by a squadron of guards, and her eyes were fixed on the Fop.

There was an uncomfortable pause.

“You do know this is _exactly_ the sort of thing that keeps getting you in trouble?” she demanded exasperatedly.

“I—I didn’t invite him!  He just showed up!”

“Oh, thanks,” said the Fop.

“Anyway, that isn’t your problem with me,” he growled, barely remembering to keep his hands stuffed in his pockets rather than flailing them in the air, “your problem was that I had a family!  Everything else I’ve done in my life, well, you could let that slide, but you couldn’t let me be happy, could you?  That just sticks in your throat.”

“Oh, stop being childish!” she said angrily.  “You’re over two thousand years old, it doesn’t become you.  This has nothing to do with your feelings or mine.  This is about the survival of our people!”

 _“I’m_ the one who bloody saved Gallifrey!  Or better yet, the whole of existence!  Would you care to count how many times?  And forget me, what about River?!  A load of you idiots were about to destroy every star and planet in the fucking universe and wipe out the entire future just to make sure no one could destroy you back, and neither of those things happened, did it?  That’s down to her!  You really think getting rid of my family’s your best bet?!”

The Fop was frowning at him.  Guess he’d yet to do that bit.

“The Matrix does not lie,” said the President.

“You lot keep saying that, but it’s sure as hell been wrong before!”

The President sighed.  “This isn’t personal, Doctor.  It’s survival.”

“You’ll forgive me if I disagree with your assessment.”

“And who’s your friend?” she asked wearily, looking to Thevros, who’d flattened herself against the far wall.

“Oh, who, me?” Thevros asked, looking around.  “You don’t…?  I mean, nobody!  Just, ah, sightseeing!  Passin' through, you know… lovely Cloisters you’ve got down here.”

“Your companion, then, I’ll assume.”

Thevros’s jaw dropped open indignantly, but before she could speak, Ariasi’s voice echoed through the chamber again.

“The Doctor is correct, Madam President.  You’ve taken a very narrow view of these predictions.  What you’ve missed is the part that all of us here will play.”

“Who is that?” the President demanded.  “Where is she?!”

“Everywhere and nowhere.  Now, hush.  You were told once before, but you refused to listen.”

“That girl.  We thought his only child with the human hybrid was the one confirmed deceased, until she was found in the archives.  She was just trying to spare her own life!”

“No.  Trying to find proof that Gallifrey, as is so often the case, would bring about its _own_ destruction.  It’s all here, if you’ve the eyes to see it.  So let me show you.”

The Doctor’s vision swam and faded, until the Cloisters were gone.  It felt as if they were still standing in place, but all around them was… time, space, everything.  The future and the past, laid out across every dimension, in a way he’d always been able to _sense,_ to an extent, but never so tangibly, so easily, so clearly.  It was all just like words in a book, there for him to simply read, in any order he liked.  He could just flip ahead, or to the last page…

He tore his eyes away from the infinite to focus on the others that had been brought in with him.  Thevros hadn’t come along, but the President and the Fop were there.  He was not looking very well.

“I’m sorry,” said Ariasi, still echoing all around them, “multiple regenerations of the same Time Lord accessing the Matrix simultaneously will also have complete access to each other's memories.  I’m sure it’s disorientating.”

“I… think I might need to sit down,” the young Doctor mumbled.

Oh, poor sod.  The entirety of his past wasn’t always easy to live with, even when it hadn’t just been plonked into his head all in one go.  The Doctor made to offer him a hand, but noticed it still glowing, and quickly shoved it back into his coat.

“Here are the prophecies of the Hybrid,” said the voice of Ariasi, “infinite scenarios generated by the neural network of a billion, billion Time Lord minds.  In each of these, the Time Lords are in some way destroyed.  Their power decimated, their control over Time lost entirely.”

As she spoke, glimpses of the prophecies played out around them: the Panopticon crashing to the ground, the city in flames.

“In some scenarios, the loss of this power leaves an opening for an outside force to lay waste to the entire planet, leaving all of Gallifrey’s people and civilisation destroyed.  And yes, in each case, it is now clear that the event is inextricably temporally linked to the Doctor.  It’s a logical conclusion to make: he has a wife and children who are literally hybrids.  Two warrior races, Time Lords and humans.  And you’ve seen to what lengths he’ll go to protect his own.”

Okay… this was definitely no longer just because he brought it up.  Who the hell were they?  He didn’t dare guess.  He didn’t dare hope.

If only he could help himself.

“Whoever you are,” said the President, “you show us only what is already known.  This is why the Doctor’s family cannot be allowed to go free!”

“Exactly.  In every scenario you pursue them.  But, entangled as they are in time, there are very limited opportunities where it is safe for you to interfere without dismantling a vast web of established events.  Even so, you’re committed to neutralising this threat.  So committed that none of the prophecies now shows a scenario in which they are no longer hunted by the High Council.  Well, then.  Allow me.”

The scenes of destruction faded and the Panopticon came into view, the Council chamber tranquil in the orange light of late afternoon, its members gathered round the table, casting long shadows.  One of them, though dressed in red, was not wearing the customary ridiculous collar.

The Doctor sucked in a breath.

“That’s—”

“Milly,” breathed the Fop.  “I… I can see all that now.”  His voice wobbled a little.

“Don’t you start,” the Doctor warned weakly.  “Can’t have both of me going all gooey.”

In the vision shimmering around them, she leaned back in her chair and kicked her feet up on the table.  A laugh burst out of the Doctor and he looked to his younger self again, sharing a hopeful grin.

“How do I know any of this is true?” the President demanded.  “You’re obviously extremely skilled in manipulating the Matrix.  False events can be created by powerful Time Lords.”

“Feel free to trace this thread in either direction.  You’ll see each path that branches out from your choice leads to a different scenario, but in each one, Gallifrey stands.  Because the Doctor and his family remain to protect it.”

The President’s eyes seemed a million miles away, exploring visions of futures hidden from the Doctors.

“I see,” she said, slowly.  “That woman in the Cloisters—”

“Also comes to Gallifrey’s defence,” Ariasi finished calmly.

“...Yes,” the President said, glancing at the Doctors again.  “You know I have no wish to hurt you, or your family,” she said solemnly.

“I believe that,” the Doctor replied.  “But it’d mean a lot more to me if you’d quit trying to do it anyway.”

“If I make this decision today, if we welcome the Doctor’s surviving daughter to Gallifrey, we will see these prophecies change?”

“That’s the thing about decisions,” Ariasi said lightly.  “They’re so very easy to un-decide.  I’m afraid we’ll need a bit more from you than that.”

The President frowned, her posture shifting defensively.

“You see, it’s impossible to rewrite a fixed point, even for me; even, I should think, in here.  But it’s really not all that difficult to create one.  Anyone can do it, given the proper circumstances.  There just need to be enough strands of the web intersecting that it’s impossible to disentangle them all without ripping a hole in the fabric of causality.  In fact, you might need only one person to make a point fixed.  It’s particularly helpful if that person is there three times.”

 _“Three?”_ the Fop mouthed at the Doctor.  He shrugged helplessly.  Suddenly it seemed he could no longer differentiate hope from dread, but he was drowning in one or the other.

“But there are still a few more threads missing from our knot.  Doctors, you’ve an appointment in a library, I believe?”

There seemed no point in arguing with the invisible, omnipotent woman.

“Um, yeah.  Yeah, we do,” the Doctor said, trading an anxious glance with his younger self.

“You’d better not miss it.  I’ll let them know you’re coming.”

“Y-you will?” he sputtered.

“Good luck.  We’ll see you when you’re done.”

The Matrix and the President faded, and when the world reformed around them they were not in the Cloisters, but back in the TARDIS.

The Fop collapsed into a jump seat.

“Alright?” the Doctor asked, springing for the console.

“Yep,” he said weakly, “don’t mind me, just a little… you thought you destroyed Gallifrey for _hundreds of years?_  But actually you didn’t?”

“Sorry about that one,” he said, cringing as he worked at the controls.

“Ugh, god,” the Fop had his head in his hands, “we were such a prick to River.  Why the hell were you like that?!”

The Doctor decided not to mention the sudden uptick in coarse language, as it was almost certainly his fault.

“You know damn well why.  Because before I even knew her, she died right in front of me.  I wasn’t ready for that.”

“I’m ready to _fix it,”_ the Fop said firmly.

“You read my mind,” the Doctor replied, the corner of his mouth turning up, and cranked down the lever.

 

 


End file.
